TNA Wrestling star Joe Hendry appeared on an episode of the Extreme Life Of Matt Hardy podcast to talk about a number of topics including his debut on WWE NXT doing great social media numbers.
Hendry said, “It’s actually [the most viewed] of the whole year now. So, even including WrestleMania, my debut is the most viewed — not just the most viewed video on X for WWE, but the most viewed tweet as well. So it’s got both of them, and it’s shortly going to become NXT’s biggest Instagram reel of the year as well. It’s pretty close.”
On handling the sudden rise in popularity:
“I’ve always been working pretty hard on creating content that I think wrestling fans and non-wrestling fans would enjoy. And that’s always something that I’ve tried to do. But I think what’s been different about this year is, two things. I’ve really dialed in on rating myself in the areas of physique, promo, in-ring work, and really just training very hard when we don’t have tapings to improve by let’s say one point out of 10 every three to six months. And not thinking about like, ‘Oh, I need to be Bret Hart overnight.’ It’s just thinking, ‘Can I be 10% better than I was six months ago?’ That has to be achievable in all areas.”
“So that’s going to have been approaching, that’s where I’ve been putting the hard work side of things. I’d say I’ve learned that from Moose. He really approaches wrestling like he approached the NFL. And he realized, ‘Oh, I should really be approaching it like this.’ So I think I gain that from him. And the other factor is understanding the importance of timing. And timing is a multiplier that will have an exponential effect on your activities. One example of that is the billboards that I had with just my face with no context. That was an idea that I wanted to do for years, but Clash at the Castle was the time to deploy it. Where, that would be funny if I just put that billboard in Glasgow at random, but to do it when there are 20,000 wrestling fans in my home country; that’s an example of the element of timing. So it’s having respect for timing and responding to things as they happen.”
On emulating John Cena:
“For me, one of the people that I kind of look at as a good person for me to emulate is actually John Cena. And I think that when I’m not super over like in previous years, I have limited time with the audience. So that’s why the real focus is on all the memeable stuff, and then pretty much only that. So all the promos are very sort of like pre-determined, and it’s only the turn and all that. Whereas now that I have some more attention, there is more room.”
“Wou know, when Cena went from Basic Thuganomics and doing the raps to who he who John Cena became, a much more nuanced character. I think I have a little bit more room now to like you say, let the people in a little bit. So I think I’m in that next phase, where I’m allowed to let some of that — some of me as a person come through. And I feel like I’m starting to tap into that thing where The Rock and Stone Could talk about, you know, ‘It’s just you with the volume turned up.’ I’m just adding a little bit of that and it’s it’s a lot of fun.”
You can check out the complete podcast in the video below.
(H/T to 411Mania.com for transcribing the above quotes)
